Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib is located in town by the same name Kartarpur (Ravi) in Pakistan. Seen from nearest town on the Indian side of the border is Dera Baba Nanak in the district of Gurdaspur in Punjab. (Express photo by Jaipal Singh)

In the first set of bilateral meetings on activating the Kartarpur corridor, a Pakistani delegation will visit India on March 13 to discuss the modalities for the cross-border pilgrimage. Pakistan has also proposed a reciprocal visit by an Indian delegation 15 days later to “finalise the draft agreement”.

Advertising

The meetings will be held to facilitate the travel of Sikh pilgrims to Darbar Sahib Kartarpur Gurudwara in Narowal, nearly 4 km from the Gurdaspur border.

“In a spirit of constructive engagement #Pakistan has proposed to India that the Pakistan delegation may visit #India on 13 March followed by the return visit of the Indian delegation to Pakistan on 28 March to finalise the draft agreement for the #kartarpur corridor,” Pakistan Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mohammad Faisal posted on Twitter.

Ministry of External Affairs official spokesperson Raveesh Kumar posted on Twitter: “We welcome the visit of #Pakistan team to discuss and finalise modalities for facilitating visit of pilgrims through #Kartarpur Sahib Corridor on 13 March 2019 to India. Follow up meeting can be held in Pakistan, as required.”

Advertising

India has also asked Pakistan to hold “technical level discussions between engineers on both sides without waiting for discussion on the modalities”.